Natural Horsemanship vs???

Hello everyone,

I have recentl been given two horses. One is a 20 year old saddle horse and the other is a 6 year old quarter horse. My experience with horses is only 4 or 5 years in my teenage years and then random riding after that.

My experience as a teenager was with various horses including Hunter/Jumpers, 5 gaited horses, my own quarter horse, and the probaby 200+ different horses I got to ride at my job at a public riding stable. I have always been comfortable around them and confident on their backs. I have also been pretty rough with them in the past. I recently started riding someone elses horses and I want to become a better horseman.

I have seen a few of the shows on RFD in the past and I am very interested in the "natural horsmanship" methods that I have seen. I am very gentle and affectionate with horses when things go well. I go towards more forceful methods when the horses begin to loose focus or become distracted .

I am interested in some general overviews of different schools of thought for training and handling horses. Are there any websites that break down some of these different methods that exist?

Hmmm, I don't know of any particular sites. One of my favorite trainers is Clinton Anderson. He seems to fit my personality and how I interact with horses the best. However, there are many, many famous (and some not so famous) trainers out there Monty Roberts, Pat Parelli, John Lyons, Chris Cox to name a few. What I like to do is to study many different trainers. Here is the reason why. A) Not everyone knows everything. You can pick up a little (or a lot, depends) from each trainer. B) Not all horses are the same, nor do they react the same. What works for one does not work for all. So, if what one trainer suggests doesn't work, you can try a different method. Good luck!

I started out with John Lyons. His son Josh and a friend of his, Keith Hoseman now have their own web site, and they have free online articles you might be interested in. Here is a link: http://www.horsemanship101.com/Newsletter/index.html

I also love Leslie Desmond, but there isn't really anything free on the internet about her methods.

Many people really like Parelli (spelling?.) I like the results, I just am not a "game" person...

I have found that patience and kindness achieves a much better (attitude) and much more responsive horse than the "old" methods. This is my personal preference. Everyone has their own ideas and preferences.

Hello Pipewelder I wish you many happy times with your gift horses .
With natural training no 2 trainers use the same matching methods
The first thing we need to understand is that horses would prefer to look upon you as a leader which does not mean dominant but trusting you to keep them safe and and healthy with good sense whilst respecting each other.
Natural training is about thinking like a horse and the way horses in
A herd situation and the order in which they live abiding by the herd rules which keeps them safe and well fed and safety with in the herd.
There are some rules with in the herd and one of many is respecting each other space as humans we ask for this respect from our horse to keep us safe and not getting pushed or stood on by our horse some horses with bad manners such as pushing and pulling and running you over is just treating you like another horse because you are not leader so he may challenge you to become leader by doing the above we can teach a horse to respect our space whilst being handled with natural training only we can't lay our ears and lower our head to say stay out of our space so we use our body posture and eye contact and if need our arm and hand with out laying a finger to cause pain .
Respect has to be earned from both of you but no pain will earn that respect it will cause worry and maybe resentment with what ever was the problem at the time and horse learn bad things as easily and good things whilst we continue to use negitive re enforcement which with out knowing we do as horse owners every day.
I f you put natural training in your search many pages will come up
Have alook at Michael Peice and who uses it to work with his young horses with gentle results and a horse who is with peice of mind and will progress because he enjoys working with his leader-man.
Horse can not learn or progress if stressed or frightened all they want to do is leave the scene hence lack of concentration and seeming difflicult .
Asking your horse a question can be asked in many ways ,find away your horse understands and he will give you the right answer even if the whole qn is not answered he will try .
Horse do not enjoy being difficult they would rather please than battle if your horse is saying I don't understand ask again in a different way he may then understand but is unable to comply for a million reasons he can't talk and tell you he is in pain or he is sore or he is unable to comply because he is afraid of what you have ask
He can't talk but his eyes and body language will tell you I can't do this or im afraid .
You need to learn and watch equine body language it tells you alot
Such as your horse is off color or your horse is in pain and also that your horse is happy and content and much more .
Natural training is not a black and white tex but more thinking like a horse and feeling and seeing how he lives his life with in the herd
As we do our family step into his world and learn rarther than expect him to step into our world and learn faster than we can .
Horse do not understand our kind of love but do understand safety in numbers and where the leader is going and where she is taking the herd to provide food and water and respecting each others space whilst achieving pecking order and breeding with in their herd.
Leadership with kindness,safety,and the needs of an equine is all you need for a happy horse you can then ask the horse many qns
Such as riding him ,metal in his mouth and riding education he will do any thing for you if you are his leader with out dominance because he trusts you and wants to be in your company with out his trust you have a unhappy horse who wants to free again.
Sorry for the spelling mistakes this was written on my way out so I rushed abit .

Thank you so much for your time. I know I probably have a longer way to go than the horses do. Neither of the two seem to have any bad habits on the grond other than one seems to have some issues with being restrained either by tying or a person holding on to the lead rope when he is trying to leave.

I am going to read up on some of these things and hopefully get some alternative methods in my head.

Hello pipewelder if you can tell me what the problem is and when it accures I may be able to help you with some ideas for you to try I have had several ponies with the same problem but I need more info best wishes to you .

I watched Buck Brannaman and couple other known trainers when started my horses. Buck was the most helpful (and easy to follow to).

I know I'll be beat back, but... :) I watched Parelli's games and personally didn't like the video much.